ASB puza

[Michael McCafferty]

Michael McCafferty wrote:
> >
> > > > In any event, the Proto-Algonquians would no doubt have had contact
> > > with the
> > > > mountain lion since it's original habitat included all of what is
>now
> > > southern
> > > > Canada.

At 09:54 09.08.03 -0700, David Costa wrote:
> > >
> > >Can we actually verify this? I know that animal ranges now are
>generally
> > >drastically different from what they were 500 years ago, but my sources
> > SEEM
> > >to indicate that mountain lions weren't present in Canada east of the
> > >Rockies -- tho that could well be just due to habitat loss. Either way,
>I
> > >would like to verify where mountain lions lived pre-contact, if
>possible.
>
Yes. I'll give you what I got. I've been working on a study of the
Underwater
Cat and its special relation to the Wabash River, which I hoped to have
ready
for presentation at the Algonquianists' conference in October, but things
have
delayed it, so it won't be ready in time for that.

In any event, in his chapter titled "The panther in Huron-Wyandot and Seneca
culture," in _Icons of Power--Feline Symbolism in the Americas_, (1998, ed..
Nicolas J. Saunders
George R. Hammell notes, "Until historically recent times the panther had
one of the most
extensive ranges of latitude of any terrestial mammal in the New World--from
the Canadian Yukon to the Straits of Magellan. Paleozoological evidence
documents the panther's presence in North America since the Late Pleiocene,
some 100,00 years ago (Kurten and Anderson 1980: 194-5; Lundelius et al.
1983:337)" (Hammell, p. 259)

(Kurten, B. and E. Anderson (1980) Pleistocene Mammals of North America. New
York: Columbia University Press; Lundelius Jr., E.L. et al. (1983)
Terrestial
vertebrate faunas. In H.E. Wright Jr. (ed.) Late Quaternary Environments of
the
United States, 1, The Late Pleistocene, Minneapolis: University of
Minneapolis
Press: 311-353).

Hammell goes on to state, "The Lower Great Lakes region was the home of the
so-
called eastern mountain lion or panther (Felis concolor cougar Kerr), whose
former maximum northerly range was the approximate latitude of the northern
shore of Georgian Bay on Lake Huron." (p. 259)

Hammell notes that the mountain lion was well attested historically in
Ontario
(p. 261), and of course in the Adirondacks. He doesn't site paleontological
or
archaeozoological evidence in eastern North America, but Pat Munson, one of
the archaeologists here at I.U. recently told me, "(mountain lions) are
certainly a
tiny/sporadic occurrence in local faunal assemblages going back thousands of
years into
prehistory in this area."

After receiving your question yesterday I wrote to another local
archaeologist and faunal expert, Rex Garniwicz, to see what he can offer,
especially in terms of the mountain lion's original range. But, as
we can see from the above, Proto-Algonquian speakers would have known the
animal, in the east and apparently the west as well.

Our Siouanist friends may be interested in knowing that in Miami-Illinois we
have (at least) six terms for the Underwater Cat:

/mih$pin$iwa/ 'great cat',
/araamipin$ia/ 'underwater cat',
/ariimipin$ia/ 'within-cat',
/akimarenia/ 'chiefman',
/lenipin$ia/ 'original or ordinary cat' (this is a late historical form)
and the one you mentioned the other day whose meaning we don't
know, /wiikweepin$ia/  '?-cat'




($ = sh, i.e., s-hacek).


Michael McCafferty

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